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Recent Revelations in the Trump-Russia Scandal

The FBI investigated if the president himself might be working for Russia.

  • After Trump fired FBI director James Comey — for refusing to end the investigation into his first national security advisor, Michael Flynn — the bureau started to investigate if the president himself might be working for Russia. Flynn is now on trial for lying about his foreign contacts.
  • Trump privately discussed withdrawing the United States from NATO.
  • Not only did he meet with Vladimir Putin five times without other officials present; Trump went so far as to snatch the meeting notes from his own interpreter and tell the linguist not to share what had transpired even with administration officials.
  • Although the report has partially been disputed by the office of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, BuzzFeed maintains that Trump instructed his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, to lie to Congress about the effort to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. Cohen has been sentenced to three years in prison for doing just that. He is now cooperating with Mueller.
  • With the approval of Senate Republicans, the Trump Administration has lifted sanctions on Oleg Deripaska, a former Russian spy and oligarch close to Putin who employed Trump’s second campaign manager, Paul Manafort. Manafort has since been convicted of financial crimes related to his lobbying work for pro-Russian interests in Ukraine.